Chase

As we approach the end of the first quarter of 2019, it’s time to activate bonus categories for card that have quarterly bonuses. All of these cards offer bonus points or cash back on up to $2000 in purchases during the quarter.

US Bank Cash+

US Bank has added a new category for this quarter, TV, Internet & Streaming Services. If you’re not already getting 5x Ultimate Rewards points by using a Chase Ink card (and even if you are!) you may want to switch the card you’re using for payment. You must register your card before mid-June to get the bonus cash-back in the categories you select. As a reminder, you choose two 5% categories and one 2% category. To register, click on the link in the email you received from US Bank.

Discover Card

Discover gave us the full year’s calendar late last year:

This quarter’s categories are Gas Stations, Uber and Lyft. As a reminder the Discover card does not have foreign transaction fees but may not be as accepted worldwide as Visa, MasterCard and even American Express. But if you use ride-sharing services a good bit here in the US you’ll be fine. To register, sign in to your Discover account and click on the Activate button.

Chase Freedom

Chase is offering 5x Ultimate Rewards points at Grocery Stores and Home Improvement stores. This is one of my favorite categories because it’s the easiest to max out. You can redeem the URs for a penny apiece on your credit card statement or, if you have one of the UR-earning cards that comes with an annual fee you can transfer these points to airline frequent flyer programs or hotel loyalty programs. Alternately you can shop through the UR portal and use the points like cash.

To register you can go to this linkthis link to look at the calendar, then click on the Activate Now button as seen above.

Happy 2019! Here’s a quick reminder that there are new bonus categories on some of your favorite cards for the first quarter of 2019:

The Chase Freedom card offers bonuses on purchases at Gas Stations, Drug Stores and on Tolls. If you haven’t already activated your card you can do that HERE.

The Discover Card is offering 5% cash back on purchases at Grocery Stores. You must register before you will receive the bonus cash back. You can do that HERE.

And finally the US Bank Cash+ card offers choices of a number of different categories for you to decide what works best for you. You can pick 3 categories that will earn 5% back and one category for 2%. All other categories will earn 1% cash back. You can make those choices HERE by logging into your account on the US Bank website.

We’re just a couple of weeks away from the end of the year, so it’s time to register for the category bonuses for the first quarter of the new year.

Discover Card

Once again Discover has released their bonus categories for the whole year. The first quarter’s category is Grocery Stores, which should be pretty easy to max out. To register, just log into your Discover account online or visit this link to log in. Note that to receive the 5% cash back you must register first before making your purchase. You can earn 5% back on up to $1500 in purchases.

US Bank Cash+

US Bank is offering the same categories as for Q4 2018 though you can choose the ones that work best for you. Select 1 of the 2% categories and 2 of the 5% categories, based on your needs. For the 5% category you can earn the 5% on up to $2000 in purchases. To select your categories, visit the US Bank Cash+ website.

Chase Freedom

For the fourth quarter the Chase Freedom card will earn 5x points at Gas Stations, Drug Stores and on Tolls. As in previous quarters this offer is good on up to $1500 in combined purchases for the quarter. I’m hopeful I can max out this card at Drug Stores but we’ll have to see. But be sure to register ASAP so you’ll earn your bonus points! To get your card activated, follow the link to this page that shows the categoriesWhen you click on the green button you’ll be taken to a screen where you enter some minimal card information

Can you believe we’re almost three-quarters of the way through 2018? As we approach the end of the third quarter, that can only mean it’s time to register for fourth quarter credit card bonuses.

Discover Card

Discover’s Q4 categories are ones that are handy for the holiday season: Amazon and Wholesale Clubs. To register, just log into your Discover account online or visit this link to log in. Note that to receive the 5% cash back you must register first before making your purchase. You can earn 5% back on up to $1500 in purchases.

US Bank Cash+

US Bank is offering the same categories as for Q3 though you can choose the ones that work best for you. Select 1 of the 2% categories and 2 of the 5% categories, based on your needs. For the 5% category you can earn the 5% on up to $2000 in purchases. To select your categories, visit the US Bank Cash+ website.

Chase Freedom

For the fourth quarter the Chase Freedom card will earn 5x points at Wholesale Clubs, Department Stores and for using Chase Pay. As in previous quarters this offer is good on up to $1500 in combined purchases for the quarter. I no longer have a warehouse club membership, don’t use mobile payments and can’t remember the last time I bought something at a department store so these categories don’t help me much, sadly. But be sure to register ASAP so you’ll earn your bonus points!

It’s the first day of a new quarter and that means it may be time to change which cards you’re using for certain purchases. As mentioned a few weeks ago, here are the categories for cards with quarterly rotating bonuses:

Discover Card

Discover Card will net you 5% cash back when you use your card at Restaurants this quarter. The most important thing to remember is that you must register your card before you’re eligible to earn the 5% back. If you haven’t done it yet, do that now!

US Bank Cash+

With US Bank’s Cash+ card you get to select your own categories: two will earn you 5% cash back and one will get you 2%. It also offers a category I’ve never seen elsewhere: home utilities. That can be especially valuable during these hot summer months. Here’s the list of categories for Q3:

To make your selections, log into your account.

Chase Freedom

Freedom is offering 5x Ultimate Rewards points at gas stations, Walgreens and for Lyft rides. Ultimate Rewards can be spent as cash back on your statement at a value of a penny a point, or if you have one of the paid UR-earning cards, like the Sapphire Preferred or the Sapphire Reserve, those points can be combined with the URs you earn through those cards and transferred to an airline or hotel partner. You may end up getting more than one cent per point value in that instance.

It’s time to activate your bonus categories for the cards that offer quarterly bonuses. All of these cards will give you bonus cash back (or points) for up to $1500 in spend during July, August and September.

Discover

For the Discover Card, restaurants will earn you 5% cash back. Remember that you must activate your Discover Card bonus BEFORE making any purchases or you won’t get the bonus cash back. To register your card, look for the email that should have been sent to you or visit this link.

US Bank Cash+

With the US Bank Cash+ Visa you can select one of three 2% categories and two of twelve 5% categories. To me the home utilities category is a no-brainer as I know I’ll spend several hundred dollars there each quarter and I know of no other card that offers that category.

Chase Freedom

Though Chase markets this as a cash back card, in fact you’re earning Ultimate Rewards points. And you can redeem each point for a penny off your credit card bill. But if you’ve got one of Chase’s Ultimate Rewards-earning (UR) cards with an annual fee (like Sapphire Preferred, Sapphire Reserve or one of the Ink cards) you can combine the URs you earn via the Freedom card with the URs earned with the other cards and get more than one cent per point in value from those URs.

For the third quarter of 2018 the bonus categories are Lyft, Walgreens and gas stations. This doesn’t help me much as I very rarely use ride-sharing and have never used Lyft, the Vanilla pre-paid debit cards found at Walgreens cannot easily be turned into cash and the gas stations around here will not allow the purchase of pre-paid debit cards with a credit card and they often don’t have the $500 denomination anyway. You can activate your Chase Freedom card bonuses here.

So for me it looks like I’ll be using my Discover card at restaurants and my Freedom card at the gas pump in Q3.

We knew it would happen sooner or later. One of the best card benefits on the market is being reduced. IHG is the Intercontinental Hotel Group, the power behind Intercontinental, Holiday Inn, Kimpton, Crowne Plaza and others. Their credit card, issued by Chase, had one of the best benefits out there: a free night at any of their properties worldwide. Even better was that the card only cost $49 annually so even if you never spent a dime on it (after meeting minimum spend and getting your sign-up bonus) it was still a great deal.

This week I received a letter from Chase stating that the free night benefit was changing:

Currently, we award this Anniversary Free Night each year after your anniversary date, and it is redeemable at any IHG property. Going forward, Anniversary Free Nights issued after May 1, 2018 will be redeemable at eligible IHG hotels with a redemption value up to and including 40,000 points.

So even though all other benefits remain the same, this is still a huge loss. I’ve got an upcoming trip in October where we’ve already used last year’s certificate for one night, we’re using points for the second night and had planned to use this year’s certificate for the third night. But I won’t get this year’s certificate until July and the hotel costs 50,000 points so I won’t be able to use it there. So we changed our plans and will stay at a different hotel the third night.

Notice the highlighted bit in the quote about eligible IHG hotels? There is a list of excluded properties and some of those go for 40,000 points or less. Summer at Mommy Points has more details in her post though she’s since had an update saying that all 40,000 point (or less) hotels will be available for the certificate. But we’ll have to see. I’m a little skeptical.

If you sign up for the old IHG card by today you can still get the certificate good for any IHG hotel in the world on your anniversary date but only for the first year. Certificates issued after that will have the 40,000 point limit.

Part of the reason for this cut back is that IHG is issuing two new cards, IHG Premier and IHG Traveler. The Traveler is the base card with an annual fee of only $29 and the sign-up bonus is 60K points after spending $2000 in the first 3 months after approval. The Premier card has an $89 annual fee and earns you 80K points after spending $2000 in the first three months. Both cards earn bonus points at IHG hotels (10x for the Premier, 5x for the Traveler), 2x at gas stations, grocery stores and restaurants and 1x everywhere else. There are other benefits regarding hotel status, savings on points purchases and bonus points based on spending thresholds. Nick at Frequent Miler has a terrific post today laying out each card’s benefits. But neither of these cards is as good as the current (old) card with it’s $49 annual fee and free night – even capped at 40K points.

Both Frequent Miler and Mommy Points include screen shots of Twitter conversations where the Chase reps say that cards approved today will get the uncapped anniversary night so bookmark those pages and sign up for the new card today. Frequent Miler has a card sign-up link in the post and on the Best Offers page.

Today is the start of the second quarter of 2018 so time to activate your bonus categories if you haven’t already done so. The Chase Freedom, Discover and US Bank Cash Plus cards all offer 5% bonus categories good for up to $1500 in spend. Both Discover and Chase Freedom have grocery stores as their category though with the Freedom card you can also use Chase Pay or Paypal to earn bonuses. The US Bank Cash Plus card allows you to pick your 5% category and new this quarter is home utilities. That’s a great category and I’m not aware of any other card offering that category so I hope it sticks around. I don’t know if it includes telephone and television services or not but if you don’t have a Chase Ink card to earn 5% on those categories it’s certainly worth testing out.

Registration is now open for quarterly bonus categories for the Chase Freedom, Discover and US Bank Cash+ cards.

Chase Freedom

Starting today you can register your Chase Freedom card and in April you’ll receive 5x Ultimate Rewards points on purchases made at grocery stores, Paypal and on purchases made through the Chase Pay mobile payment system. You must activate by June 14, 2018 to earn 5x during this quarter but you don’t have to activate before you make your purchases. You can earn the 5x points for up to $1500 in purchases. After that you’ll earn the usual 1x points per dollar. Note that you won’t earn points at Wal-Mart or Target grocery stores unless you pay via Chase Pay or Paypal.

Discover Card

Discover has chosen to reveal their entire 2018 calendar and for the second quarter their 5% cash back category is Grocery Stores. To register, just log into your Discover account online or visit this link to log in. Note that to receive the 5% cash back you must register first before making your purchase. You can earn 5% back on up to $1500 in purchases.

US Bank Cash+

US Bank is changing things up just a little by adding Home Utilities and removing Bookstores. Select 1 of the 2% categories and 2 of the 5% categories, based on your needs. For the 5% category you can earn the 5% on up to $2000 in purchases. To select your categories, visit the US Bank Cash+ website.

Registration is now open for quarterly bonus categories for the Chase Freedom, Discover and US Bank Cash+ cards.

Chase Freedom

Starting today you can register your Chase Freedom card and starting in January you’ll receive 5x Ultimate Rewards points on purchases made at gas stations, for internet/cable/cell phone service and on purchases made through mobile pay systems like Apple Pay, Android Pay, Chase Pay and Samsung Pay. You must activate by March 14, 2018 to earn 5x during this quarter but you don’t have to activate before you make your purchases. You can earn the 5x points for up to $1500 in purchases. After that you’ll earn the usual 1x points per dollar.

Discover Card

Discover has chosen to reveal their entire 2018 calendar and for the first quarter their 5% cash back categories are Gas Stations and Wholesale Clubs. To register, just log into your Discover account online or visit this link to log in. Note that to receive the 5% cash back you must register first before making your purchase. You can earn 5% back on up to $1500 in purchases.

US Bank Cash+

US Bank is always the first to reveal the categories for the next quarter. As we reported last month, they have their usual array of categories for you to select 1 of the 2% categories and 2 of the 5% categories, based on your needs. For the 5% category you can earn the 5% on up to $2000 in purchases. To select your categories, visit the US Bank Cash+ website.